I like having an excuse to visit the 5th Floor of Mitchell Library. It is brim full of information on Glasgow Life through the ages. VisitWestEnd had commissioned a few gallery artists to paint a mural just off Byers Road, and I was one of those artists. I wanted to unearth a worthy and interesting candidate to depict, and found just such a one. This is Kooroovi. Her name means Little Bird in Tamil as she was born to a Scottish Tea Plantation owner in Sri Lanka. She and her family then came home to Glasgow where she lived her whole life in the West End.
De Courcy Lewthwaite Dewar is her correct name. She was born on 12th February 1878 and died on 24th November 1959. She was a suffragette and artist. Specifically she was a silversmith with a specialism in enamelling. By some bizarre coincidence the pitch I was allocated for my mural is the wall of Stevenson’s jewellers, and they appear to be chuffed to have a silversmith depicted on their wall. The jeweller and staff were certainly attentive to me as I stood outside their premises applying paint to their wall, and kept me supplied with tea.
Kooroovi trained at The Glasgow School of Art (me too) and she taught there for 38 years. She worked also at the studio in her home at 15 Woodside Terrace. Her influence spread beyond the art world however, and she started a home for destitute women. She also inaugurated an institute for the teaching of practical skills. A woman not to be forgotten, and now she has a monument. Long may the weather be kind to it.